


you'll pry my kratos motherhood headcanon from my cold dead hands

by vespertilionidae



Category: God of War (Video Games)
Genre: Gen, Gore, Possible Character Death, metaphorical childbirth, pretentious writing in general, somewhat sexual impalement
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-12
Updated: 2018-09-12
Packaged: 2019-07-11 06:49:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15966944
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vespertilionidae/pseuds/vespertilionidae
Summary: Kratos births Hope at the end of the world.A re-imagining of God of War 3's final scene.





	you'll pry my kratos motherhood headcanon from my cold dead hands

**Author's Note:**

> until mr coriander balrog lets me write for god of war i can and will do whatever i want
> 
> mostly a re-write of the ending of god of war 3, except i go uncomfortably into detail about it. also athena is better.

By this point, the pain is negligible. The sword sinks slow into Kratos’ abdomen, the weight of it thick and warm in his entrails. Kratos bites his lip to stifle a moan. He has been waiting for this for far too long, and a mixture of anticipation and fulfillment threaten to overwhelm him. The sword is heavy against his abdominal wall as he feels release nearing. His flesh clings to the sword as it tears through fat layers, rips through the rectus abdominis muscle, and thrusts into the penetralia of his body. Aside from the thrill of anticipated eternal consummation, the purely carnal sensation of the sword’s sharp caress against his viscera is gratifying as it slides deeper inside him.

There is a sense of completion as the sword pierces through his intestines, past his lower spine and, finally, entirely through his body. He leans his head back and slips forwards, satisfied but trembling.  Black blood seeps from the wound, and runs down his Adonis belt to pool around his hips. His body is split, the gash forming a broad channel running through him. The line of the cut is slightly offset, leading diagonally from his suprapubic region to just below his left rib cage. Not as precise as he had wanted; he had, as he so often does, let his passion affect his actions totally, leaving no room for preparation or consideration beforehand. Hopefully, though, the wound will serve its purposes. This isn’t so much a suicide, although it is certainly that as well, as it is the nascency of something Kratos doesn’t quite yet understand.

Athena stands before Kratos, watching passively as his blood slowly trickles down to her feet. She leans forwards and gently lays a hand on the hilt of the sword. She stares at him as she tightens her mouth, and her grip on the hilt. Kratos doesn’t break eye contact. He will not allow her involvement. This was his own act, done by his own hand, for his own aims. They stay there, silent and unmoving for what to Kratos feels like time unending but can’t possibly be more than a few seconds. Finally, the corner of Athena’s mouth twists down, and she moves her hand from the sword’s hilt to place it over Kratos’ right temple. Her eyes soften, pupils dilating as she takes his hand and squeezes it sympathetically. Kratos does not react, of course, but he knows that she can read even his non-reactions perfectly, of course. His sister’s presence is unbearably abrasive, yet he realises her absence would be wanting; Kratos says nothing. Athena breathes in deep, obviously an attempt at reassurance, and gives a strained smile in encouragement. Kratos can only bring himself to nod.

Kratos wraps his free hand around the hilt, pulls out gently. His abdominal muscles involuntarily contract as he feels something begin its effluence from his innermost soul. Athena looks down at the wound in surprise, but Kratos can’t afford her much attention as his focus is eclipsed by his labour. His body contracts again as more of the substance escapes him. The sensation of its exit is much like a child being torn from its mother, painful in a metaphysical sense, permeating the entire body, beginning at the vagus nerves and extending to the extremities. Kratos has felt this before, at Calliope’s birth and death, and once more at Pandora’s. The memories surrounding his children are so easy to recall; Kratos feels them as they are with him in the present, as if this essence’s exodus was a convergence of both children’s short lives.

In a sense, he realises, this is a convergence of birth and death, his body releasing a new qualia even as he, body and soul, dies. Calliope and Pandora though, are not present in this accouchement, as much as he would like to fool himself into believing they are. They are surrogates, context in which Kratos can process the pain and unfamiliarity of this thanatotic genesis. The drive inside him, which he is delivering currently, has been powered by Calliope, and more recently, Pandora as well; it, and by extension, they, have lead him through all the events of the past few years (decades? He can’t remember.) up to this moment. Hope has spurred his revenge since the very beginning; he admits, he has been selfish. Now, clearly, it is much too late for atonement, but the act of the thing will have to be good enough for him.

Kratos’ children have been with him through all of his many labours, and especially now he keeps the memories of Calliope and Pandora close to his heart. He misses them both dearly: Calliope, who was of his own flesh, whom he had loved for all of her short life; and Pandora, though not of his blood, she whom he grew to love as he loved his own daughter. He has been long without Calliope, and though the pain of her absence has not diminished, it has dulled, whereas the loss of Pandora is still sharp and biting. He would have done anything to spare them suffering, and yet it was by his own hand that each child met her end. Kratos knows he will receive no absolution, no, he believes that any kind of redemption would be grotesquely unjust. Still, he continues in the hopes that somehow his daughters will be avenged through his feats.

Kratos is not naive enough to expect a reunion at his death, but the hope still within him kindles his desire to join his children. It’s cruel, to himself and to the memories of his daughters, but he can’t help but want to continue living, just for the infinitesimal chance that he may see them again, in whatever circumstances this unpredictable and tragic life might bring. What will happen to Kratos’ soul is uncertain at this point; ideally it will be wholly destroyed. Kratos doesn’t want oblivion, not yet, but he knows that by the end of this he will have no reason to continue, even as pure soul in the Underworld. He can only hope Calliope and Pandora’s souls will go on in peace long after his is gone.

The spirit of hope has caused him much grief, and in one sense he is relieved for it to leave him. And yet there is a sense of loss as well, as his body contracts to release the expectations and desires that had accompanied him throughout his journeys. Ironically, it is the very sense of the thing that leaves him that fuels his desire to keep it inside him. While his life has been ravaged by hope, the loss of it feels like the loss of another daughter. However, it feels less like the death of a daughter, and more like the departure of a daughter from her mother. Kratos knows he will grieve for her, but unlike Calliope and Pandora, she will still live after she leaves him, and, in time, may return to him.

Labour pains wrack Kratos’ body as he delivers Elpis to what remains of the world. Her birth is exquisitely agonising, and with each convulsion he feels, finally, closure approaching. He knows the world will not be better off with her presence, but, maternally, he wants her to exist in it, regardless of how it may view her. Kratos’ intestines twist as she forces her way out from the incubation of Kratos’ body. Finally, all of her leaves him. Kratos cries out in pain as his erector spinae curves involuntarily, raising his middle and forcing his shoulders flat against the ground. Immediately, he is hit with despair at her absence, so strong that he, finally, allows himself to cry.

Athena, eyes wide, steps back and hold her arms up to her chest, almost as if cradling something there. She touches where her heart would be. Athena looks down at Kratos, weeping and writhing on the ground, and turns away. She pulls the Blade of Olympus from where it rests inside Kratos, and tosses it to the side. One hand still to her heart, Athena walks away. Kratos, through a blur of tears, watches Athena leave.

Kratos’ trachea burns as sobs tear from his throat. He had expected this sorrow, but not to this degree. Kratos feels the loss of three children at once, and for once does not have any hope to persevere through it. Underneath the anguish though, a faint sense of closure floods Kratos’ chest. His daughter, while torn from him painfully, is alive and will survive him.  Through the pain, he is filled with a love for her, a fiercely maternal emotion filling his body. Like this, he is almost at peace. Kratos can feel consciousness fading, finally, and he does not resist. Behind him, rosy fingers stroke the sky as dawn breaks over Greece.

**Author's Note:**

> in a lot of ways, kratos strikes me as a motherly character. mostly in an angry mama bear way. anyway, i thought it would be neat to extend the 'having/finding and losing children' theme to the final scene.
> 
> also i know the 'thanatotic genesis' phrase is way over the top, even for this, but it's something of an inside joke so legally i had to keep it


End file.
